Brief History of Education in Nigeria
Western or formal education was started in Nigeria in 1842 —
only at the primary level — by the Christian missionaries who managed the
educational system according to their respective philosophies.
The missionary organizations available then were the Chord
missionary society, the Wesleyan Methodist, and the Catholic.
Secondary education was established in 1859 and the first
secondary school was CMS Grammar school, Lagos. The reason behind the delay of
secondary schools was not well known. Though, there are insinuations that it
was because the missionaries thought that secondary education can induce some
critical thinking in people, which may not be helpful for their policies.
During this period, the British colonial government couldn’t
interfere in the education system due to some political and financial factors.
But in 1872, they started to intervene in the education system by giving
donations to the missionary societies to support education.
In 1882, the colonial government brought a document-
Education ordinance, with the aim of having total control on education. This
was their first formal pronouncement in education in Nigeria. Schools were
classified then into Government and private school. The government school were
financed entirely through public funds but the private only receive little aid
from public fund
The 1882 education ordinance was cumbersome to implement in
Nigeria because the curriculum, the method, and the medium of communication was
too foreign for a Nigerian child. All these led to the failure of the ordinance
and another ordinance was provided in 1887. The new ordinance was seen as the
first effective effort made by the colonial government to aid education.
Though, only some metropolises in Lagos were covered then.
More foreign teachers were employed, more schools were
established and financial encouragements were given to the missions, voluntary
agencies and private individuals to establish more schools.
After amalgamation, Lord Fredrick Lugard- then the Governor
General of Nigeria, set up some new ideas. These ideas form major part of 1916
ordinance. The ordinance came into existence exactly on 21st of
December, 1916. Since the ordinance took place after amalgamation, it was able
to take care of the country as a whole.
The northerners had for long been resisting the intrusion of
western education either from the colonial government or the missionaries.
Lugard met with leaders from the north to convince them that the education will
not affect the Islamic tradition which is more paramount to the northerners.
After 73 years from the date of establishment of the first
secondary school, the first higher education institution was established in
1932. The first institution was the Yaba Higher College. The college was
established in 1932, but commenced studies in1934.
In 1948, The University College Ibadan was created, starting
with just 104 students. The number of universities rose from one to five in
1962. And in the 1970s and 1980s, an appreciable number of higher institutions
was established. Statistics show that, in 1980, the number of students that
gained admission into primary school was about 12 million, 1.2 million for
secondary school, and 240,000 at the university level.
Today, western education has suffered many damages. The
standard of education that the schools were known for is no more. Nigerian
university graduates lack the proper knowledge and skills to acquire
employment. Measures must be put in place for Nigerian education to attain its
past glory
INTRODUCTION
Three main educational traditions, the Indigenous, Islamic
and the Western, are known to have flourished at various times in Nigeria. Each
type of education served its purpose for its consumers but also had its
problems.
Even in these days of western-type education, and at this
dawn of the new millennium, our educational system is still beset with numerous
problems in spite of the progress so far made. This paper examines the trend in
the educational development of Nigeria from pre-colonial times to the present,
with a view to highlighting the progress made and problems encountered on the
way.
More specifically, we present an overview of the indigenous,
Quranic and the western-type education before and after independence. We also examine
some problems in Nigerian education, especially access, discipline and funding
and indicate desirable direction for the future.
NATURE OF INDIGENOUS EDUCATION
Indigenous education represents the type of education
offered in the pre-literate era, within the community, by community members who
possessed specialized skills or abilities in various fields of human endeavour.
In most communities, prior to the introduction of formal education, boys were
brought up to take to whatever occupation their fathers engaged in. In some
other cases, the boys were sent to other masters as apprentices to learn
various vocations and life etiquette.
Although occupations varied accord ing to the geographical
areas in Nigeria, the major ones were farming, trading, craft work, fishing,
cat tle rearing, wine tapping, traditional medicine and black-smithing. The
boys also engaged in such other training activities as archery, tree climbing
and wrestling. Intellectual training for them consisted of their sitting
quietly beside their fathers at meetings and listening attentively to learn the
process of such tasks and skills as arbitration of cases, oratory, wise sayings
and use of proverbs.
All these stimulated their sense of rationality. Girls were
often expected to stay back at home to learn domestic and other chores such as
cook ing, sweeping, weeding the farmlands, hair weav ing, decorations of the
body, dye production; and the like from their mothers. As in the case of the
boys, the girls did almost exactly what their mothers trained them to do.
Generally, therefore, in spite of geo-political variations, traditional or
indigenous education in most parts of Nigeria trained individu als to fit
usefully into their society by learning and practising economic skills for
self-sustenance; adapting to their role expectations and contributing to the
development of their society.
Although the traditional education offered by the community
was comprehensive such that it provided training in physical, character,
intellectual, social and voca tional development, it however had its
limitations. For one thing, in the absence of writing, people depended on the
power of their memories to facilitate the retention and transmission of all
learned ideas to future generations. But memory could fail, and in the event of
the death of a custodian of some useful information or skill, all was lost.
There were, however, little or no cases of unemployment.
Islamic Education In Nigeria:
Records show that Islam was first accepted by a Kanern
ruler, Umme Jilmi (1085 - 1097). Subsequent rulers, Dunama 1 (1097-1150) and
Dunama II (1221 - 59), continued the tradition of Islamic learning such that by
the end of the 13th Century, Kanern had become a centre of Islamic learning
(Fafunwa, 1974:53).
In the early 14th Century, Islam was brought into Hausa land
by traders and scholars who came from Wangarawa to Kano in the reign of Ali
Yaji (1349 1385). Before long, most of what later became the Northern Nigeria
was islamised. Islamic education brought along with it Arabic learning since
Arabic is the language of the Quran and was therefore perceived as having great
spiritual value. Arabic and Islam were taught simulta neously in primary
schools. As a result of the polit ical and social influence which Islam and
Quranic learning conferred on those who possessed it, many rulers employed
Islamic scholars as administrators.
The Jihad by Uthman Dan Fodio helped to revive, spread and
consolidate Islamic studies and extend access to education also to women. Thus,
before the arrival in Nigeria of the Western type education in the 19th
Century, Islamic learning had been established. Islamic studies had also penetrated the Western parts of Nigeria before the arrival of the Jihadists; but
the Jihad strengthened the religion where it was weak. Support for Islamic
education came from some Northern Nigerian leaders, especially Abdullahi
Bayero, (Emir of Kano), who, on his return from Mecca in 1934, introduced new
ideas by building a Law School for training teachers of Islamic subjects and
Arabic as well as English and Arithmetic.
The school continued to grow and expand in scope such that
before long, and with the support of the then Northern Region Ministry of
Education, it had grown into the popular Bayero College, Kano, which became a
part of Ahmadu Bello University and later the present Bayero University, Kano.
The institution helped to expand the scope of Islamic studies in Nigeria. Many
institutions have sprung up over the years, in many parts of the country, for
the purpose of teaching Islamic ideas and practices. However, one major problem
of this educational tradition is the focus on Arabic which, in many parts of
Nigeria, is not the language of literature, instruction and cor respondence.
The Western-Type Education. This educational tradition,
began seriously in Nigeria with the arrival of the Wesleyan Christian
Missionaries at Badagry in 1842. It has obviously been the most successful in
meeting the overall formal education al needs of the consumers for the present
and the future. Between 1842and 1914, about ten different Christian missions had
arrived and begun intensive missionary and educational work in Nigeria. Schools
were built and the missions struggled for pupils/members such that there was a
proliferation of primary schools established by different missions. Although
literary education in in the 4Rs (reading, writing, arithmetic and religion) was
predominant, this new missionary education prepared the recipients for new job
opportunities, as teachers, church evangelists or pastors, clerks and interpreters. Emphasis was also on character training. Most of the missions
established primary schools and, initially, little emphasis was laid on
secondary and higher education.
But following agitations by influential church members, rich
merchants and emigrants living in Lagos, the CMS Grammar School Lagos, for
example, was established in 1857. The .western-type education developed faster
in the South than in the North of Nigeria because of the skepticism of the
Muslims about the impact of Christian missionary education. By 1914, it was
estimated that about 25,000 Quranic schools were already in existence all over
Northern Nigeria. Thus, the arrival of Christian Western education met stiff
opposition. However, in some parts of Northern Nigeria, the Christian
missionaries did succeed to establish schools, at times, in collaboration with
Government.
Much of the educational work in Southern Nigerian, prior to
1882, was done by the missionaries almost without government assistance.
However, from 1882, the Government began a bold intervention by promulgating
codes and regulations, guidelines and policies on organization and management
of schools. Government also began to appoint inspectors and to make grants to
schools to ensure quality. Thus, between 1882 and 1950, many codes and
regulations were issued by Government to regulate the quality of education in
various parts of the country. Between 1952 and 1960, each of the then three
regions enacted and operated new education laws (the West in 1955, both the
East and North in 1956). The initial experiment at Universal Primary Education
Programme was started in the West and East in 1955 and 1957 respectively.
The West African Examination Council, (WAEC) was set up in
1952 as a corporate body charged with the responsibility of conducting
examinations in the public interest in West Africa. Such examination were to
qualify candidates for certificates which were equivalent to those from similar
examining authorities in the United Kingdom (Adeyogbe, 1992).
Furthermore, in 1959, the Federal Government set up the Sir
Eric Ashby Commission to identify the high-level manpower needs of the country
for the future. The Ashby Report prescribed that education was indeed the tool
for achieving national economic expansion and the social emancipation of the
individual (Aliu, 1997).
It recommended the establishment of four Federal
Universities in the country, and presented some vital courses for them. Five
universities, instead of four, were subsequently opened as follows: University
of Nigeria, Nsukka (1960), Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria (1962), University of
lfe, lle-ife (1962), University of Lagos, Lagos (1962), and University of
lbadan, first established as University College, lbadan in 1948. University of
Benin was later established (1972). As of 1999, Nigeria had forty-one
universities made up of twenty-five Federal, twelve State and four Private-owned.
Among them are specialized universities, including three Universities of
Agriculture, seven Universities of Technology, as well as a military
university, the Nigerian Defence Academy, Kaduna.
These have been established in the bid to address specific
areas of national needs. Other tertiary educational institutions such as
Colleges of Education, Polytechnics and Colleges of Techno logy were also set
up during the years. The National Universities Commission (NUC), established in
1962, has the task of coordinating the orderly development of the Nigerian
university system and maintaining its academic standards. In 1977, the Joint
Admission and Matriculations Board (JAMB) was created to regulate the admission
of students into the universities, taking cognizance of available spaces and
federal character. Student enrolment in universities has risen from in a mere
1,395 in 1960 to over 250,000 by 1998/9 session.
